Barriers for preventing water ingression, acoustic ingression, and the like have been typically located between an outer, sheet-metal door portion and an interior door trim portion. Referring to FIGS. 4 and 5, a conventional door assembly is shown generally at 100 and includes the interior door trim portion 102, the barrier portion 104, and an outer, sheet-metal door assembly including an outer panel portion 106 and an inner panel portion 107. As illustrated, the trim portion 102 includes a molded boss portion 108 that receives a head portion 110 (FIG. 6) of a fastener portion 112.
The door assembly 100 is assembled by inserting the fastener portions 112 through the barrier portion 104 and inner panel portion 107. To maintain the desired positioning of the barrier portion 104, an adhesive strip or bead 114 is provided on an outboard side 116 of the barrier portion 104 to affix the barrier portion 104 to the inner panel portion 107. To ensure that the adhesive strip or bead 114 adheres to the inner panel portion 107, compressible foam plastic portions 118 are placed between the trim portion 102 and an inboard surface 120 of the barrier portion 104. In addition to ensuring that the adhesive strip or bead 114 adheres to the inner panel portion 107, the foam plastic portions 118 provide supplemental sound attenuation features.
Although adequate for most applications by preventing the ingression of water and acoustics into the vehicle, the door assembly 100 requires a series of manufacturing steps and a plurality of parts. For instance, the fastener portions 112 must be stocked at the assembly location for connection to the molded boss portion 108 of the interior door trim portion 102. Then, the plastic foam portions 118 must also be stocked at the assembly location for positioning against the interior door trim portion 102. Then, the barrier portion 104 is placed over the plastic foam portions 118 as the fastener portions 112 extend through the barrier portion 104. Upon completing this sub-assembly, which is generally shown at 122 (FIG. 6), the fastener portions 112 may engage the inner panel portion 107 to complete the door assembly 100.
Accordingly, a need exists to reduce the number of parts and manufacturing steps associated with conventional door assemblies.